A packetful of sugar helps the writing assignment go down.

If the kids are already moaning and groaning about those term papers, compositions and college entrance essays filling their assignment books, take a tip from my favorite writing coach, Roy Peter Clark from the Poynter Instititute. In a column on the Poynter Web site, he describes a lunch he had recently with a couple of professional writers.

To describe the organization of a recent story he wrote, Clark says,

"Tom reached across the lunch table and grabbed three packets of "Fresh Naps," a brand of moist towelette, and two pink packs of sweetener. He spread them across the table in this color pattern: WHITE PINK WHITE PINK WHITE. Each packet represented an imagined section of the story -- the white ones a main narrative string, the pink ones a developing subplot. As we talked about the story, Tom moved the pieces like a Three-Card Monte dealer, describing some possible connections and transitions. Tom returned the packets to their places, but I confiscated them. Never miss a chance to claim a writing tool. Who knows? Maybe they'll wind up in a journalism museum at Indiana University, along with Ernie Pyle's typewriter."

Clark gives a couple of other examples of famous writers -- like Gay Talese -- who literally blocked out writing projects with big squares, a visual teaching tool that just might help the kids construct a solid essay out of many little pieces of information. It might even help the adults finish up that Valley Voices column they've been procrastinating on, hmmm?